In the first year of the Tang Dynasty (705 AD), Zhang Kamzhi and others launched a palace coup and forced Empress Wu Zetian to pass the throne to the crown prince Li Xian, and Li Tang's world was restored. Li Xian, emperor Zhongzong of Tang, who had a weak personality, did not drastically reorganize Li Tang's country, but ceded the power of the imperial court to the empress dowager clique led by Empress Wei. Empress Wei shi was bent on learning from her mother-in-law Wu Zetian, and she also thought that one day she could sit on the throne of the empress. In June of the fourth year of Jinglong (710 CE), Empress Wei, who was impatient to ascend to the throne, joined forces with her daughter Princess Anle to poison her husband Li Xian of Tang. The Li-Tang dynasty was once again in turmoil.
After poisoning Li Xian, Empress Wei Shi thought that she could not personally come to the foreground and directly ascended the throne as emperor, and the best way was to set up another puppet emperor and actually manipulate the authority behind the scenes. After Li Xian's death, the most likely emperor was naturally Li Xian's younger brother Li Dan the Prince of Xiang and Li Xian's son. Li Dan once became an emperor, and there were many sons and sisters Taiping Princess behind him, and he was powerful, and Wei Shi would never choose to make Li Dan emperor.
Emperor Zhongzong of Tang had four sons, Namely Li Chongrun, Li Chongfu, Li Chongjun, and Chongmao. Only Li Chongrun was born to Li Xian and Empress Wei, but was killed by Empress Wu Zetian before that. Li Chongfu was at odds with Empress Wei, and Li Xian was demoted from the capital Chang'an after he ascended the throne. The third son, Li Chongjun, was made crown prince in the second year of Shenlong (706), but because he was not born to Empress Wei, he was not ambitious in the palace, and the young and vigorous Li Chongjun was killed after a failed coup d'état. Webster eventually chose Li Chongmao, the Wen king who was only 16 years old.
After poisoning Li Xian, Webster blocked the news and announced that the emperor was seriously ill and did not see the chancellor. At the same time, he conspired intensively to make Li Chongmao the Prince of Wen crown prince. When Wei Shi thought that everything was in order, he announced the news of the death of Emperor Li Xian, and summoned the imperial court to read out the so-called testament of Emperor Zhongzong Li Xian, supporting the crown prince Li Chongmao to ascend the throne, himself regent of political affairs, and Li Dan the Prince of Xiang as the prince's eunuch and lieutenant, changing the yuan tang long. A series of operations by Webster successfully and justifiably monopolized the power of the dynasty, completely excluding Li Dan and Princess Taiping from real power.
Before Merriam-Webster's dream woke up, someone came out to stir up trouble. On June 4, Li Chongmao succeeded to the throne, and on the evening of June 20, Li Longji, the third son of Li Dan the Prince of Xiang, later Emperor Xuanzong of Tang, led the forbidden army to launch the "Tanglong Coup", killing the actual manipulator of the imperial court, Empress Wei, and the main members of the empress dowager's forces, and successfully seizing power in the imperial court.
However, the person sitting on the emperor's throne at this time was Li Chongmao, who was established by Wei Shi. On June 24, 710, in front of the Taiji Hall of the Tang Court, a solemn Zen renunciation drama was staged very formally, and Emperor Li Chongmao, in the face of many princes and ministers of the imperial court, declared himself young and incompetent, and was difficult to assume the big responsibility, and voluntarily gave up the throne to King Xiang! After Li Dan, the Prince of Xiang, resigned, he ascended the throne again, becoming the later Tang Ruizong, changing his name to Yuan Jingyun.
According to common sense, Li Longji, who launched a palace coup, could have killed Li Chongmao directly in the melee, or he could have directly imprisoned Li Chongmao as a party of Webster. However, Li Longji and Li Dan, the King of Xiang, did not do this, why? Although Li Chongmao was emperor for only twenty days, he was the son of the former emperor Li Xian, and he was also the only son of Li Xian's only two remaining sons who had the conditions to inherit the throne, so Li Chongmao ascended the throne as the new emperor, which was completely legally feasible; second, Li Chongmao did not participate in the poisoning of the former emperor Li Xian, he was an outsider to the whole incident; third, Li Chongmao did not belong to the party of Wei's concubines, he was only used and manipulated by Wei Shi, and he was not guilty of itself, for the loyal Li Dan. He did not want to kill his brother's son again.
Although Li Chongmao officially ascended the throne as the emperor of the Tang Dynasty, because the time of being an emperor was too short, he did not really grasp the power of the emperor, and the later emperors of the Tang Dynasty were all descendants of Li Longji of Tang Xuanzong, so Li Chongmao was not officially listed as the emperor of the Tang Dynasty in history.
Four years later, in the second year of the New Century (714 CE), Li Chongmao the Prince of Xiang died in office at the age of twenty in the history of Fangzhou, and was posthumously honored as Emperor Wu.